Bound in their Bones
by ladylately
Summary: Loki makes a different choice, and escapes the final battle of the Avengers. Unfortunately for Darcy. Luckily, she's good at making herself useful. Will continue past Thor: the Dark World and end up with some influences from Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Updates Sundays
1. Chapter 1

"ENOUGH!" Loki screamed at the green beast before him, apparently startling it. He took a breath, and the moment seemed to stretch before him endlessly. _Enough_. It was enough. He was exhausted, the staff was lost, and he'd seen the measures the Midgardians had taken out of fear of their mindless 'ally'. Pride or sense? He had a choice. _Thor_ had pride, Thor was very nearly the incarnation of pride itself. It made him a fool. No, Loki would not have pride. It was not useful. Better to embrace his own reputation as a snake, was it not? If the Chitauri won, well and good. He'd take his place as king. But if they failed-and these lost souls did seem to be putting up rather more of a fight than expected-then Loki still would have the last laugh. He rather liked the idea. As the ravening beast moved towards him, he called to hand the last dregs of his magic...and left.

Norway. They might as well have sent him an invitation.

Darcy hadn't stuck around for long after finding the news feed for Jane. The bit of smugness she'd felt after seeing the S.H.I.E.L.D. drones' faces had worn off quickly, and watching Manhattan was terrifying. But it was Jane that was _really_ hard to watch. She looked so...heartbroken. And terrified, and hopeful. It was too much for Darcy. She'd done her bit, and now she was going to hide in the half-decent hotel room that their fake invitation had at least included. Now was the time for a drink, and despite the unfortunate fact the hotel didn't include a minibar that she could bill to S.H.I.E.L.D., it had taken Darcy all of two minutes upon arriving in Norway to acquire some fancy Norwegian whiskey. Or 'akevitt'. Aquavit. Whatever. It wasn't her normal thing, her normal thing being 'cheap and strong', but it was good ambience when Darcy managed to tear Jane away from staring at stars through a variety of telescopes and got her out into the fresh air.

She'd just gotten up from sulking on the bed to fetch the booze when something very tall and smelling of ozone and acrid smoke popped out from nowhere in front of her. Fingers immediately closed around her neck, hard enough to cut off her scream and almost enough to crush her throat.

The figure was a pale man, Loki, and their vision must have focused at about the same rate because the fingers slackened just in time to save her larynx as he seemed _surprised _to not recognize her. "You-You're not- You're _wrong!_" he snarled, dragging Darcy to him to examine her face. Her toes skimmed the floor and she grabbed onto his wrist with both hands, trying to keep herself from choking.

"Where is the woman, where is Foster?! I know she was sent here!" Blue sparks washed across his face, and the hand on her throat tightened as his eyes glazed over. "Always _always_ I tell him he has to learn that he is not ready that he is not worthy and then this stupid pathetic mortal woman has him for a week and it's all better and he's ready to be king and I am ruined and shamed and made fool of again! Again I am the spare brother the child the liar the mischief-maker who can do no right and I am _wrong_ and _evil_ for wanting to destroy those _monsters_ once and for all and I- will- not- have- it-! _WHERE IS SHE?!"_

Spittle landed on her face as he ranted, and Darcy was momentarily distracted from her own imminent death by deep-seated revulsion. Red spots swam in her vision, and she managed to dig her nails into the exposed skin of his hand.

Loki screamed in her face, blue sparks flaring from his eyes, and the moment Darcy knew she was dying, the blue lights faded and he let go. She shoved herself away from him, landing painfully on her back. There was silence as she gasped for several breaths, and when she finally managed to look up, the asshole was still standing there with one hand stretched out. There was a pulse that drilled straight through her skull and hilariously _wrong _Mumford &amp; Sons banjo solo that had been coming thinly from her earphones cut out. The life seemed to drain out of him as she watched, and he collapsed into a leathery pile.

Darcy kicked the nearest bit before she moved another muscle, just to make sure he was down. The pile didn't respond, and Darcy scrambled to her knees, feeling almost drunk on relief. With a heave, she rolled him over partially onto his back, and pulled one eyelid up. His pupils were dilated, his eyes spark-free, and he was completely out. Right. That was awesome. Darcy stood up slowly, trying to keep her head from swimming too much. Her cellphone was still on the bed where she'd left it next to her iPod. When she tried to turn it back on the screen only turned white like the last one had when she'd accidentally washed it. Wonderful. At least the lights still seemed to be working, Darcy didn't like to think about being stuck in the dark with Thor's brother. That was a little too horror movie even for her.

There was the requisite hotel landline, but when Darcy tried it, there was only a screeching sound instead of a dial tone. Not good. He'd apparently done _something, _and she didn't like the thought of leaving him alone in a hotel full of probably innocent people. Darcy sat on the foot of the bed, idly kicking him as she thought. If Loki was here, the scary stuff in New York was probably winding down. That meant Jane would probably be escorted back to the hotel by the S.H.I.E.L.D. goons soon, right? And Thor was back. Jane would be getting into contact with him immediately, and he'd take this gangly problem off Darcy's hands, right?

So it was a good idea to stay here and watch him. Well, probably not, she could admit that, but in her nerdy and reckless heart-of-hearts, Darcy wouldn't mind getting to play the hero for a minute. She tried to believe it would be okay, and not cry, and be practical. She was already failing at the second part, but practical she could do.

He _stank_, for one. And she couldn't imagine the asshole would appreciate the ungraceful lump he'd landed as. Keeping him happy was probably a good step to keeping her head on her shoulders, just in case he woke up before Jane and the proverbial cavalry came. Probably he should go on the bed, but even with a maid service for the sheets she didn't think the mattress would survive. He was covered in blood and dust and other yuck and blood and _who's blood is that? Don't think about it_. But she couldn't, and she could feel her heart pounding again and she was getting dizzy and he was sure to wake up any second and she would die and Jane would come back and the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents would get blindsided and they'd all die and it would be her fault and _clean him up._ One step. Darcy breathed slowly, counting the seconds.

He was tall but skinny, and she thought she could manage it. She'd started dragging Jane to the gym when she had started getting to obsessive about the science after Thor left, since the gym had showers, which was a step above the lab even if they were both boring as shit. Darcy had decided that Sif was probably a good fitness goal and she hoped that the small amount of muscle mass gained as a result would let her drag around the dickhead on her floor. _It_ was covered in a shit-ton of metalwork, though, and she wasn't about to drag around all that.

Darcy had always kept some type of pocketknife on her ever since in high school when she'd accidentally dated a coke dealer, and it was nice to have a somewhat paranoid backup when her taser wasn't an option. Norway, as it turned out, was pretty much the exact opposite of the weapon-happy United States, but she had gone out and bought a cheap set of cutlery that included steak knives. Which would do just fine on leather, so there was something to be said for Asgardian fashion sense.

They would probably do fine on skin, too, considering. That was one way of fixing the problem. Was it still murder if you killed a freaking supervillain? Probably not, if said villain were awake. Even if she, like, cut his throat now, she probably still wouldn't get convicted. Her fingernails had left a mark, and he seemed drained enough that it would work.

But extrajudicial execution wasn't exactly Darcy's style, not to mention against every reason she'd wanted to go into politics in the first place. Although she was pretty sure that _not_ killing a mass murderer when she had the chance would kill that career choice just as dead. Maybe she could convince Jane to pay her.

It took her almost a half an hour (with frequent breaks to check her communications, nothing) to strip him down to a surprisingly bland undershirt and pants, despite the fact she was just cutting him out. The assface dressed like a puzzle, and if it was possible she hated him even more for it. Finally done, Darcy crouched, hooking her arms under his shoulders, and _heaved_. She only got halfway to standing, but it was enough she could move him. He was insanely heavy, much more than his height should have accounted for. By the time she'd managed to dump him in the tub she was out of breath, and in revenge she turned on the coldest water possible.

He looked _awful_, sickly and bluish, his side and back almost entirely one ginormous bruise. There were gashes and scars under his shirt as well, but they all looked older than a day even with Asgardian healing taken into account. She rinsed him off, using the cheap hotel soap to clean the open wounds, and that started some of them bleeding again. Probably better than leaving the dirt in them, and there were plenty of washcloths to be makeshift bandages. She also washed his hair, which might have been a little weird, but he looked like he'd drenched it in a combination of glue and lard and she wasn't going to inflict that on the pillowcase.

It took almost twenty minutes to actually get him back to the bed and then on it after she'd sort-of dried him off. Darcy finally managed it by dumping his upper body onto it, laying on her back on the floor, and kicking the rest of him upwards. She stood, breathing heavily, and took a minute to make he wasn't being smothered before walking to the other side of the bed and sitting down heavily. Her iPod, at least, managed to turn on, and she put on her most energetic playlist to try to counteract the drop from the adrenaline rush she'd had, and leaned tiredly against the headboard. What were Asgardians _made_ of? Something stupid, and stupid heavy.

The music wasn't enough, and Darcy was asleep before she realized her eyes were closing.

Loki came to with his skin feeling like it was on fire and the absence of a headache he'd gotten used to long ago. That was different. He kept his eyes shut, feigning sleep, and took an account of his senses. Most of his regalia had been stripped from him, and he was damp. There was rough cloth on all his wounds, which was unpleasant. He was laying on a bed, less so. Someone was next to him on the bed, breathing deep and evenly. Loki cautiously cracked one eye open.

There was a woman sitting next to him, quite asleep. Not Foster, but definitely still a pathetic Midgardian. Passably fair. His mind struggled for a moment, and he realized she must be the one who'd shucked him of his clothing, which was a bold move to take after nearly having the life wrung from her. And an odd choice. Odd was always interesting; Loki near specialized in odd. The assistant to the good doctor, likely. Truly, the girl would have to learn to be more cautious. Quick as a snake, he wrapped his hand around her throat again and her eyes snapped open. First lesson.

"I think perhaps it was a poor decision on your part to sleep, don't you think?" he sneered. She looked confused, not precisely the reaction he was hoping for. Seeming to realize something, the girl reached towards his hand, and he tightened his grip on her neck. Not enough to hurt, but enough to remind. She paused a moment, then, staring at him, reached past his hand to pull something from her ear. Tinny chanting about bees or some such* blared from the object, and Loki realized she couldn't have heard him. The girl reddened and hastily pulled a matching bead from her other ear, and yanked the cord from the little purple rectangle on her lap. She swallowed nervously, her pulse as fast as a rabbit's under his hand.

He sighed. So much for an elegant introduction. "You're not very smart, are you?"

A flash of anger crossed her face, barely a flicker, but Loki was awake enough to see it. He pressed harder a moment, and the fear came back. "I didn't- I didn't kill you!" she squeaked.

Loki chuckled drily. "And as anyone would tell you, that was a very foolish thing to do."

"S.H.I.E.L.D. will be here soon, if they aren't already. Someone will come to check on me." She eyed him, in a rather more calculating fashion than he would have liked.

"As if you forces could intimidate me, mortal. You will be dead before then and I will be gone." Probably. He was tired to the bone.

"Then why didn't you kill me instead of waking me up?" She took as deep a breath as he would allow her. "I don't think you could. You're hurt. I don't think you can even get up. I've helped you." The girl raised her eyebrows in an austere expression, out of place on such a lushly-featured face. "I think you need more help."

He released her neck in favor of cupping her chin and running his thumb lightly down her cheek. He was gratified by her uncertain expression. No need to let himself seem too predictable. "You're not wrong, little mortal, although I doubt you know what you offer. I accept your offer of help."

"It's not an offer. It's a deal. Me and Jane? We're safe, completely. Either one of us gets hurt, you..." She paused, lost. "I want something. Something to keep me safe even when you're better. Or S.H.I.E.L.D. comes. Even if you kill me, you know they'll come."

"You realize limited value when you see it, I suppose?" He was too tired and too hurt to care much for games. Would that he had his staff, then this would be so very simple. "Should the life of you or Jane Foster fall into danger, I shall..." Loki paused, thinking. "Lend you my power, I suppose." Not that the girl would know what do with it. "In return, you will aid me in _any_ way you are able. Until such time as we both agree to be quit of the other." He pulled one of the girl's hands free from it's white-knuckled hold on the sheets and laced their fingers together, gripping hard enough she yelped. "Have we a bargain?"

"Yes," she said quietly, watching him closely. "I don't know if you've done something to the phones, but I need them to work."

Loki dropped her hand and gestured lazily, fighting to hide the fact that bile rose in his throat as he dragged the magic out of his body. "Very well. Keep me hidden, mortal."

She glared. "My _name_ is Darcy-" A hellish screeching emanated from something on the floor on her side, and she scrambled to fetch it. "Yes, Jane, it's me, I'm _so_ sorry, my phone must have died while I was asleep, I'm fine-sometimes I go to bed when I'm stressed, lady! I-" Her words faded as Loki slept again.


	2. Chapter 2

"So when's our flight to New York? I've never managed to go, and I want to see if Broadway still exists," said Darcy as she passed Jane her third cup of coffee of the morning. Not that Darcy would ever tell Jane this, but it was also the older woman's last caffeinated cup for the next six hours or so. There were ways to keep Jane alert without giving her heart palpitations, even if Jane would ever acknowledge that. But an intern's job was to protect the mind _and_ cardiac functioning of genius, or at least Darcy kept telling herself.

"How did you know we were going to New York already?" Jane's eyes didn't even manage the full flick up to Darcy's face and back to the data, her vision instead landing "nonchalantly" somewhere over Darcy's left shoulder.

"Duh. Hot n' blond is there and Erik's in the hospital. Not even you can ignore that combo for-" Darcy waved her hand vaguely at the ceiling, "-especially since, like, false pretenses and all that S.H.I.E.L.D. junk getting us here. So did you get the tickets or is that my job?"

Jane sighed and managed to make eye contact this time, a rare wonder. "Yeah. I asked our _handlers,_" Jane nearly snarled the word, turning the full force of her glare on the nearest S.H.I.E.L.D. lab monkey; who turned slightly pink, to Darcy's endless amusement, "if we were _allowed_ to go back to our own country. They've got us on a red-eye tomorrow, which means we'll be getting to New York in the middle of the fucking night, but I guess that doesn't matter."

Darcy was impressed. It was extremely unusual to hear Jane cuss about something other than faulty equipment, but probably the stress of your potential boyfriend being back on the planet and your father figure being involved in nearly destroying the world would bring anyone's head out of science. "That seems like a really long fli-time difference, right. Hey, that could be called time travel, right? That's science-y, isn't it?That's fun!"

Jane did not appear to be amused by the oddities of heading west through different time zones. "It means I won't be able to see Erik for hours! I tried to get them to fly us out this afternoon-they're using their own jet since the New York airports have an emergency shutdown-but they wouldn't listen to me!" Jane's voice turned ragged, and Darcy laid a tentative hand on the woman's shoulder.

"Hey, hey. You can't go into a hospital all wigging out and junk. A couple hour's sleep means you won't be freaking Erik out while he's in the hospital, right? And I can _totally_ get somebody to brief you or whatever when we land. I've got a very convincing crazy smile." Darcy was doing her best soothing voice, which had gotten a lot of practice when Jane called her the night before.

Jane sighed again and rubbed a hand over her eyes. "You're probably right. I can't believe I'm saying that."

Darcy grinned, patting Jane on the shoulder. "See? I knew I'd get you to admit it eventually, boss-lady. You take the day off, huh? I can pack for us both if you let me out of the lab." A day off for Jane meant not having to worry about dumb people things like clothes and truth be told, Darcy probably knew Jane's wardrobe better than Jane did at this point. And Darcy wanted to check on the little problem she'd left behind, besides.

"Yeah, sure, thanks. I've got plenty of qualified grunts for once," said Jane absently. That stung a bit, but that was scientists for you.

Opening the door to her hotel room was a careful and nerve-wracking process. First, Darcy had to make _absolutely sure_ that the hallway was empty. This included checking around all the corners and calling all the elevators to the floor, because you never knew when some S.H.I.E.L.D. personnel would pop up behind you like a Hun in the snow. Halfway through her check, Darcy remembered that security cameras were a thing and that someone was definitely watching them and probably wondering what the hell she was doing. Feeling like an idiot, Darcy hustled back to her room and walked in with her eyes closed. She wasn't ready to deal with him if he was awake, yet, and she'd prefer to delay finding out as long as possible.

"Midgardian." Definitely awake.

His voice was smoother than it had been the night before, although there was still something in it that chilled Darcy. Of course, that could also have just been the fact the room was extremely cold. Apparently he'd figured out the AC in the three hours she'd been gone, which had to be the equivalent of Darcy teaching herself how to use one of those giant old computers that ran on vacuums.

"Darcy. My name is Darcy," she said, opening her eyes nervously.

He was sitting on the edge of the bed with a book in his lap, one of the various mythology studies Darcy had acquired since Thor had dropped out of the sky. She'd managed to get several extensive binders together on anything having to do with Norse mythology and had made some select and untranslated purchases since she'd landed in Norway, but it seemed Loki preferred something called 'Unexplained Mysteries' that Darcy had picked up at a yard sale while on a visit home. He looked her over with a critical eye, and Darcy was sure she had been found wanting. Honestly, that was probably a good thing.

"So you have said," he murmured as he turned back to his book. "I require a large amount of food. Fetch it for me." He dismissed her with a wave of his hand.

Darcy bristled, opening her mouth to tell him exactly where he could shove his 'fetch it', but her legs were walking her out of the room of their own volition before she could. _Not_ okay, very much not good, and honestly slightly terrifying. Not...entirely unexpected, though. For all the times she'd made up _extremely_ specific wishes as a kid on the off-chance she encountered a genie, Darcy hadn't done too hot during the previous evening's negotiation.

At least there was a store within walking distance.

Despite the vagueness of the command, Darcy resisted her impulse to buy all the worst that the Scandiwegian palate had to offer her. He might ask her to be a food-tester or something in case he thought she'd try to poison him. Which was probably fair, since she was already greatly regretting not taking the best opportunity she'd ever have to perform the Cellblock Tango last night. _He ran into my knife ten times, you know how gods are, officer._ She let out an involuntary little giggle of terror.

Besides, Asgardians probably loved that sort of thing, and were probably the ones that came up with the terror of Scandiwegian cuisine in the first place. Darcy had trouble believing that anyone other than a race of super-resilient beings would consider lye a good ingredient.

He didn't look up when she returned, laden with bags, only when she dumped said bags in his lap on top of the book he was frowning at. Then, Loki glared. "There are many ways we could go about this, girl. Do you really wish to make it more difficult for yourself? I did not think it possible to _over_estimate your intelligence."

"I repeat: my name is _Darcy._ Lewis. And the more scared you try to make me, I promise the more annoying I'll get." It probably wasn't a good idea for self-preservation to threaten him, but Darcy thought it would be difficult for her to be more terrified than she already was. It had changed to be less of an actual emotion so much as the background music of her mind, and she'd take the chance to get on some better footing.

Loki rolled his eyes, picking the bags up off his lap and setting them down on the floor next to the bed. "Of that I have no doubt." He smiled suddenly. It was not a nice smile. If anything, it only made him look more skeletal. A weirdly handsome skeleton, but still a skeleton. "The use of your name for your obedience, would you say? A more than fair trade, surely you agree?"

She crossed her arms, trying to make it look more like defiance and less like she was giving herself a much-needed hug. "No. But you play nice, I play nice."

"Very well, Darcy. _Please,_" the word dripped with condescension, "do set out the sustenance you've acquired."

With a _very_ quiet huff, Darcy started to lay out the food on the bed next to him. Estimating by what Thor ate when he was hungry, she'd gotten _three_ grocery store roast chickens, a loaf of bread, and some vegetables of the finger food variety. And some fancy cheese. She hadn't been able to resist, and snagged a piece as soon as she was done. "I hope you can leave soon, because in the morning we're gone." And thank god for that.

"Adequate," he said, glancing at the food and deftly tearing off a chicken leg. "I should be restored enough by then. Sit. I have questions."

She turned the desk chair around to face him and sat, her stomach twisting in unease. "I don't understand anything about Jane's research. Just fyi. Please don't ask me." Darcy wondered if the strange compulsion to follow his orders let him know if she was lying. It was only really a lie in the technical sense, though, right? She'd gotten better at the technobabble translating, but it didn't help much. Maybe he wouldn't notice. She hoped he wouldn't notice. Darcy closed her eyes briefly, willing herself to calm the fuck down before she started having a full-blown panic attack in front of a mass murderer. Although, thinking like _that_ wasn't helping.

If he didn't notice, that could be very good.

It was a shame Midgardians were so susceptible to temperature changes, really. The girl had a decent figure and it was wasted under her many layers of fabric. But loathe though he was to admit it, cooler temperatures seemed to help speed his healing and despite the knot of loathing building in his chest, a swift recovery was paramount.

Lovely, but currently useless and now impossible to dispose of. And staring at him with unsettling attention. "What are you skills?" he asked sharply. She started, discomfited by the tone, and dropped her eyes. Good. "Useful ones, mind." Although certain recreational ones could certainly be put to use down the line.

"I'm good with computers. And...finding things with them. Sometimes things I'm not supposed to." She paused. "I've got a lot of practice organizing data. And stuff." She fidgeted in her chair, avoiding eye contact. "Look, this is turning into a very weird job interview. I'm a fast learner, love people, I super want this job and think I'd make great contributions to the world of supervillainy or whatever, especially since it seems like I don't have a choice."

"You don't."

"Thanks for reminding me. I'm majoring in politics, if that helps. With the prince thing and all that."

Loki couldn't help but laugh, especially when the mortal seemed to realize what she'd said and clapped a hand over her mouth. "I am no prince, but I _will_ be a king. Be wiser in the future." She nodded hurriedly, bringing another smile to his face.

There was silence for a time as he ate, which was mortal did nothing but stare at her hands and fidget, but as long as she maintained her quiet it didn't matter. Her books, at least, were informative, although Loki doubted she realized how much. "What do you know of pyramids?"

"Which ones? They're all over. It's not exactly a rare kind of shape." Her answer was prompt, a sign of her cowing. Good. "Why, planning are starting human sacrifice up again?" The sarcasm of her tone proved, however, that it was not enough.

He smiled the same unfriendly smile again. "Perhaps. I speak of Egyptian pyramids, 'the' pyramids, as it were. There is evidence of time slowing?"

"Yeah, it's super weird. It's got something to with, like, gravity and density and shit. But it's way more than it should be, a couple minutes. It was almost Jane's pet project instead of her wormholes." The girl shuddered and gripped the arms of her chair like she was trying to will her legs to let her up. "Look, I have to pack, okay? I have to go." Loki nodded his assent, and only then did she manage to flee.

He'd been gone by the time she returned, and to her great relief he hadn't popped up again since. That was one less thing for Darcy to deal with, and with Jane's impending breakdown she had more than enough on her plate without douchey megalomaniacs. Especially since he'd taken some of her books with him.

They'd been informed of Thor's departure when they'd landed in New York and Jane had started looking around hopefully.

"Where's Thor?" Darcy asked, since actually asking didn't seem to occur to Jane.

The agent accompanying them looked surprised. "We don't know. He left not long after the battle, said something about Asgard? We thought Dr. Foster could tell us about it."


	3. Chapter 3

It took a moment for Jane to respond, her smile turning to confusion. "I'm sorry, what?"

"He said, that is Thor said, that without knowing the location of, um, Loki, he had to go back to," the agent said and swallowed, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, clearly bewildered by what he was having to talk about (_definitely_ new, thought Darcy), "...Asgard."

"What?" Jane repeated in a strained voice, and Darcy put a hopefully comforting hand on the older woman's shoulder.

The agent paused, apparently lost for words, and then perked up. He patted his jacket and pulled out a folded piece of paper. "He did leave a note! A message, I mean, I wrote it down for him. Would you like to hear it?"

Darcy nodded vigorously behind Jane, who was staring morosely at the sky and unresponsive.

The agent cleared his throat. "Right."

The note went:

_My dearest lady Jane, I am so sorry I could not stay. My brother is lost and I must find him, for he must answer to our father for his crimes. I do not know when I shall return, for the Bifrost yet lies sundered. I regret not seeing you again._

When the agent finished, Jane took a deep, shuddering breath. "Is-is that _all?_" The agent nodded quickly and Darcy let go of Jane's shoulder and backed up a couple of steps, hands up.

"I have waited a _year! _I have worked on building a bridge, ignoring new occurrences in favor of _machinery_ for a _year!_ And he comes back to Earth and I don't even know because of _you!_" Jane stormed up to the agent, jabbing her finger at his chest.

"Dr. Foster-"

"Shut up! Give me that!" She snatched the scrap of paper from the agent's hand and threw it on the ground. She also stomped on it, which was pretty dramatic even for one of Jane's rants. "He leaves me a note he didn't even write himself! He didn't say _goodbye!_" Jane drew a breath and let out a ragged sob instead of continuing her tirade, and Darcy came forward and put her arm around Jane's thin shoulders.

Jane sighed and leaned slightly against Darcy. "Please take us to our hotel."

"_After_ you take us to a liquor store," added Darcy.

"I don't think I'm permitted-" said the agent, and Jane skewered him with a glare. "Right. If you'll follow me, ladies?"

It was a long night, although not as long as it could have been in the hotel S.H.I.E.L.D. originally tried to put them in. Between Darcy's 'How _dare_ you!' voice and some _beautifully_ timed tears from Jane, they managed a room in a place with actual room service, a first for either of them. Halfway through the second bottle of wine, Jane finally spoke:

"Am I being pathetic?"

Darcy's heart broke a little at how _tired_ Jane sounded. Jane never sounded tired, even when she hadn't slept for 36 hours. She just got more and more wound up, like a clock on the verge of breaking, until she got so bad that once Darcy had had to lock her into the trailer. It might have been freaky, if it weren't one of the things Darcy (who could sleep more than a drunk koala) admired about her. "Nah. You got swept off your feet a little. Pretty sure even science can't compete with all that muscle."

Jane smiled slightly. "Yeah, you're right. But it's time to get back to our lives, I think."

Darcy sighed. "Jane..."

They were sitting on each end of the couch, leaning against their respective armrests with their legs tangled over the middle. Jane extricated herself, pulling her knees up to her chest and hugging her legs. "You kept telling me he'd come back. Well, he did. And then he left again. I can't publish anything on trying to build an Einstein-Rosen bridge generator. But If I can understand the _structure_, I can share that. That's my real work. You got your credits six months ago. Erik got hurt. It's time for all of us to go home."

"Fine. But if you give your Bifrost-thing to the suits, you know Tony Stark'll get his hands on it, one way or another," said Darcy, swirling the last of the wine in her cup absentmindedly. Jane was right, Darcy had put her education on hold long enough. Plus, going home might serve as a distraction from the gnawing guilt she felt. If she'd outed Loki somehow, Thor probably wouldn't have left. Or at least he'd have seen Jane first, probably.

Jane snorted. "No, don't worry, I'm keeping it. I'll be damned if I let Tony Stark get his hands on _my_ work. He'd probably end up gate-crashing Valhalla or something."

Dracy grinned and reached over to clink her glass against Jane's. "Definitely. And I have dibs."

They'd gotten through four bottles of wine, and Jane regretted letting Darcy talk her into it. Or rather, letting Darcy keep refilling her glass while _listening_ at her. From someone normally so chatty that her running commentary normally turned to a helpful buzz at the back of Jane's mind, it was unfair. Although that might have been Jane's hangover talking. Darcy, as usual, had been the first one to wake up, and waking Jane up with a cup of coffee at the ready might have been enough to earn Jane's forgiveness if it hadn't turned out they'd missed the start of visiting hours at the hospital by two.

Jane was restless getting ready, she always was, and the headache made it worse. It was only when they were on their way (taking a rather convoluted route, since the damage had caused things like gridlock far beyond the bounds of the 'Battle of New York', as they were calling it) that she managed to still herself. _Calm. For Erik._ Darcy, however, seemed to take up the mantle of fidgeting, tapping her hands on her knees and staring out the S.H.I.E.L.D. car's window with a level of concentration that discomfited even Jane. "Are you all right?"

Darcy jumped slightly and hunched her shoulders, still resolutely watching the streets. "I'm fine!" She glanced at Jane and smiled, relaxing her posture. "Just, um...worried about Erik, you know?"

Jane nodded uncertainly. She'd never known Darcy to worry much, even after all their equipment had been seized, being more apparently annoyed by the inconvenience of it all than concerned they were going to be black-bagged (Jane had a tendency towards wild conspiracy theories, one she'd felt fully justified in after New Mexico). It wasn't like her. But Erik, hopefully, was more important than an iPod, and Jane let the thought pass. "I'm worried too."

Erik was awake when they got to his room, thankfully, and seemed relieved to see them. There was a bandage on his forehead, and he looked tired, but otherwise fine. He didn't even have an IV, although there did seem to be an unusual amount of machines crowding the small room, from what Jane recalled of the soaps Darcy was so fond of watching. At least he didn't seem to be strapped to the bed, like Thor had been.

He raised both arms in greeting as they walked in, beaming. "Jane! Darcy! I thought you..." He trailed off, his brow wrinkling in confusion.

Jane smiled reassuringly and pulled a chair up to the bedside. "Norway, Erik. We were in Norway. We're fine." He smiled slightly, and Jane looked up to see Darcy still standing in the doorway. _Odd._ She waved Darcy to come in, and the girl took the other chair.

"Hey...Erik. Heard you got brain-scrambled."

"Darcy!" said Jane automatically, before the tone of her voice registered. Off, again. It took Jane a moment to qualify the sound. Nervous, not like the usual casually affectionate rudeness that she treated everyone with. Darcy wouldn't meet Jane's eyes.

"There were...stars." Erik's voice was quiet, distant. Jane and Darcy both nearly jumped out of their skins and turned back to stare at him. "I knew how to build the right machines, the portal...Oh, Jane. It's gone. I'm so sorry." He almost sobbed, and Jane leaned down to hug him.

"Shh, it's okay. We can figure it out, Erik. Do it right this time."

Darcy got up quietly, and Jane watched her over Erik's shoulder as she awkwardly patted him on the back. Jane wanted to call her back (Darcy was the one who was better at reassuring people, after all, and if anyone needed some irrelevant joke it was Erik) but the girl waved, mouthed the word 'technobabble', and left before Jane could say anything.

Darcy's heart was pounding and she had to take a minute to catch her breath before she could smile back at the questioning glance their S.H.I.E.L.D. escort gave her. "Hey, they're gonna be all 'science!' in there, it cool if I head to the cafeteria? Scout's honor I just want some coffee and junk." She waved three fingers vaguely and he nodded, a smile flashing briefly before going back into Stern Bodyguard mode.

The steam from the coffee against her face helped steady her nerves, and she went about adding an embarrassing number of creamer packets to her cup. The way Erik had sounded...like he was remembering something from one of those super intense dreams, and Darcy felt wide awake. Besides, she didn't think she knew anything she hadn't known already. _Would I even know if it was new?_ She took a sip. Probably, right? Probably not mind control. They'd been told a little bit about what had happened before they'd been allowed to see Erik, and as far as Darcy could tell after a surreptitious check in her compact's mirror, her eyes hadn't turned into glowy blue raspberry.

She wondered when he'd turn up again. If he turned up again.

It was a couple hours before Jane tracked her down to the cafeteria, and by then Darcy had spent most of her money on stupid-tiny creamer packets and broken her own rules about drinking too much coffee. She'd run down the battery in her phone and had been reduced to pacing around the table, trying to work off the nervous energy of _waiting_. For him.

"Seriously, Darcy, are you okay? You're not acting like...you."

She closed her eyes, thinking. Best lies were ones that were mostly truth, right? "I'm upset, okay? This was Puente Antiguo all over again except _this_ time it wasn't just one huge-ass robot, it was an army of _alien monsters_. And the bad guy didn't get sucked up into the sky, he got away!" _He got to me. He could have gotten to you, Jane. _"Is this going to be a regular thing now? Like, we weren't screwed up enough all ready, we have to deal with other planets coming and messing with us out in the open now, instead of just kidnapping some cows? So yeah, _I'm a little upset!_"

Darcy realized she was shouting, and sat down abruptly with her stomach in an over-caffeinated knot and her legs turned to jelly. It hadn't really hit her until she'd seen Erik. Was she going to end up looking that...lost?

Jane sat down next to her and took one of her hands, sighing quietly. "It's been a lot to process."

There was silence for a while. Finally, Darcy spoke: "You're right. We should go back to our lives. We all need some...normal." _And if I'm being a normal student, maybe he won't bother me._ She looked at Jane and cracked a lopsided smile. "If you need another assistant again, though, don't find some new person. They won't keep an eye on you like I will."

"But I'll get so much work done!"

It was a month before Darcy could return to Culver proper, six credits in the bag. She'd taken on only a few classes and found a job as a waitress, determined not to return to the dorms. She was allowed, now, and after a year out of the swing of things it was difficult to go back to being one of many students, as opposed to being the person babysitting a couple of scientists.

Her apartment was minuscule, but it was safe. Safe for other people, at least. She didn't like the idea of Loki dropping in somewhere and a roommate getting caught in the crossfire. Darcy knew he would turn up eventually. He had to. She couldn't face the sensation of waiting for the other shoe to drop for the rest of her life. Better to get it over with as fast as possible.

By the end of the second month, she was having nightmares almost nightly, and still there was no sign. Jane's emails slowly petered off as the older woman got more and more absorbed into her old work, and Darcy let them. It was easier to just have to keep track of herself, and she was too tired to fake her normal chattiness, even in writing.

The end of the third month and the dread had settled slightly. The nightmares still happened, but they were quieter and she'd gotten so used to them that she didn't even wake up anymore. She'd stopped feeling sick all the time, and her GPA stopped its slow creep downward.

The fourth month, and Darcy had resigned herself. He'd come back, or he wouldn't, and there wasn't much she could do about it except keep people away from her apartment. She wasn't sure how he'd found the hotel last time, but he'd gotten the wrong room and she didn't want there to be mistakes this time that could cause even more collateral damage. So she went on a social media blast like any future campaign manager should, Instagramming all her food and nails , tweeting in all her classes, and even trying her hand at writing a blog (which failed). All of it linked back, of course, to her Facebook. All of it linked back to her address. It was almost like being her old self again.

One way or another, six months in all went past and she never quite managed to forget the sensation of waiting for the bottom to drop out. She never quite managed to have a night's sleep without the dread of waking up to a hand on her throat, even when her dreams turned towards the painfully mundane.


	4. Chapter 4

It was almost a relief when he dropped back into her life.

It was when she came home from one of her shifts at the restaurant she found him, laying asleep in her bed. He was fully clothed and covered in dust and her first thought as she crept towards him, almost as if she were being reeled in, was: _Washing blankets is _such _a pain. _He looked younger, asleep and sprawled out like that. He even seemed less dangerous, if you didn't know better.

All the tension and uncertainty that had been winding up inside her for the past six months, keeping her going and moving like she'd never managed to do before, drained away at once and Darcy fell to her knees, resting her forehead on the edge of the mattress. She felt empty, and she realized she was shivering and tears were starting to run down her face. Darcy let herself cry.

A hand rested lightly on the back of her head, and for a moment she panicked. But all that happened was that he gently stroked her hair as she sobbed. It took several minutes for her to quiet, and all the time there was that insistently calming touch. "I must say, such supplication suits you, although I expected a more hostile greeting."

She looked up slowly, forcing herself to meet his eyes, and he pulled his hand away. "What do you want me to do?"

Loki smirked. "Many things. What I _need_ you to do, however, is find something out for me." A business card appeared in his hand, written in what looked like an Arabic script.

Darcy sighed, gathering herself together again, and looked at him flatly. "You know I'm one of those lazy monolingual English speakers, right?"

He _tsk_ed at her. "I suppose I should have expected that. You could hardly be more useless. No matter, such a problem has a simple enough remedy. Hold still." He produced a knife.

Holding still was easy. She couldn't have moved if she wanted to, and she _very_ much did. He only pricked his thumb, and she relaxed again for a second before he reached over and began to _draw_ on her _forehead_ with _blood._ "Um. What the hell?"

"You're more useful with languages. It's a temporary enchantment so that you may use Allspeak, although if you've any magical talent it may...stick around. Unlikely," he added dismissively. "Here."

He passed her the card, and suddenly she was free to take it. Darcy stared at it and blinked several times, her eyes watering slightly. The original text was still there, but there was the ghost of an English translation overlaying it, and a third layer on top of _that_ that was a confusing combination of both. She tried reading the English aloud. All that came out was her own voice in an unfamiliar language, and she had to suppress a yelp of surprise. "That's...really creepy. And convenient, I guess." She paused and looked back up. "Uh, am I speaking Asgardian or whatever? Like, right now?"

Loki rolled his eyes. "No. Although should you _intend_ to, you might."

"Huh. Okay." Very deliberately, Darcy swiped her thumb across the spot where he'd drawn, causing Loki to glare at her. Her thumb was clean, not even a trace of dried blood. "What? I had to check, it's my _face_." She stood. The small distraction of the card had done more to settle her than the unexpected (and very uneasy) contact ever could. She felt better than she had in months. The other shoe had dropped into her _bed_, and it wasn't as bad as she'd thought. So far. "What do you want to know?"

"This man studies pyramids. I require his data. I'm sure you can figure out something." Because that was just so, so helpful.

Darcy's mouth quirked into a bemused smile. "Uh, sorry, d-" she managed to stop herself before calling him 'dude'. Habit or not it didn't seem appropriate. "You're going to have to be more specific? Because I super doubt you care what pyramid he thinks is prettiest, or something." Although burying him in irrelevant data was probably a good plan, it didn't come naturally to Darcy for her to deliberately do badly, even for a boss she despised. She'd obviously have to work on that.

His expression flickered from its customary resolute disdain in response. "I did wonder if you'd use that loophole to your advantage. I must thank you for your _loyalty_." _Oops_. "I require all of his schematics on the structure and layout of Djoser. In addition, there will be documents on radiation testing of the contents and materials, as well as information on the densities of the stone and such."

"Most of that's publicly available, you know, d-" She stopped herself again. "Look, what should I call you? Because I'm pretty sure you'd object to 'dude'."

He smirked. "You are correct in your assumption. I believe the proper form of address for a king in your tongue is 'your majesty', is it not? That shall do quite nicely."

She balked. "Um, _hell_ no. Since when are you a king?"

Loki's eyes widened and he jerked up to sit facing her, his hands curled into loose fists. Darcy forced herself to stand her ground and maintain eye contact. It was tricky. His face was a perfect copy of when he'd tried to strangle her, and every cell in Darcy's body was screaming at her to flee."This pathetic realm would be blessed to call me its king!"

She swallowed, choosing her words carefully. "Kings are made by right of conquest or inheritance. We beat you. _They_ beat you, I mean. Your army's dead. And _you're_ the one who...you, like, disowned yourself. Besides, even if you hadn't, this isn't Asgard. Or-or the other place." He shot to his feet, one hand reaching for her a moment before he jerked it back. _Can't kill me_. She made herself breathe. He was _very_ tall. Being shorter than Thor didn't mean much in human terms, it turned out, and Darcy had never been forced to stand six inches from Thor with him looking like he was about to kill her. "Thor-Thor told me," she said slightly breathlessly, and closed her eyes for a second, embarrassed at her tone. It took an enormous amount of willpower to open them again. "You're not a king. You're definitely not mine."

"_I am your master!_" The words were a shout, and she flinched.

Very slowly and _very_ carefully, she brought one hand up to place flat against the center of his chest. She pushed him back away from her gently until he hit the bed and had to sit down again. It was almost shocking that he'd let her. "I'm not calling you that either," she replied firmly.

A muscle in his jaw twitched. Finally, through clenched teeth he said: "You may address me as '_sir_'."

Darcy couldn't resist a smirk. "I'm sure plenty of women would love to." The flash of surprise and confusion on his face helped her un-knot herself. "Don't worry about it. I could live with that, if I have to."

"_You do_."

_Can't kill me_. She smiled brightly at the thought, causing another split-second of uncertainty to cross his features. "Especially since you can't do anything to me." He opened his mouth and she raised her hands to stop him. "I'll just get to working on this, huh?" Darcy gestured with the card and turned on her heel to leave the room.

She wondered absently if he watched her go.

After several minutes of staring at the spot where she had stood, he'd endeavored to sleep again, but was unable. _Not a king._ The girl, most frustratingly, had been correct in her assertion. His bid for rulership had failed, and he had little desire to put more effort into ruling such a drab little world. He had spent six months hiding and reading the watered-down history of Midgard, and every second spent choking down the foolishness and lies made him long for Asgard. Not the people. Especially not the man he'd once called father. But the books, the knowledge, the supplies for spells to see the past play out before his very eyes...that was hard to forget.

Loki turned back onto his side to stare at the door of the disheveled room. He was bored. Well, not bored. Frustrated. The spat kept running through his head, overwhelming even the sense of impatience at having to wait for her to complete the task he'd set. _Not a king_. He sighed. Perhaps eventually...no. He could not even garner the cooperation of one mortal who was _compelled_ to obey him. Without the staff he had been granted, Midgard was far beyond his reach, let alone Asgard. There was a long road full of preparations he had to go down before his _birthright_ would yet again be in his grasp.

He'd felt drained after the battle, for far longer than he should have. Even now, every spell required a far greater effort than he'd come to expect after a lifetime of learning. It had been the staff, he knew now. No creature save the far-gone celestials had the capacity to truly hold one of the gems, and apparently long-term exposure to even a mere key was too much for an Aesir.

_Not an Aesir._

Frost Giant.

The words burned in his mind and he threw himself up from the bed, his feet hitting the floor with a loud, ominous crack. Loki sat back down gingerly and reached down to press his hand against the carpet, feeling for damage. It seemed sound enough, and he was bitterly pleased he wouldn't have to use magic. The gift of Allspeak had taken more than he'd shown, even with using blood as an amplifier.

There was a soft knock on the door. "What are you doing? D-_sir_," she fair spat the word, and he smiled to himself. "Don't break my furniture. I can't afford it."

Loki waited until well after her footsteps had turned away from the room before he got up and opened the door. She was sitting at the miniscule kitchen table, her computer open in front of her, and was writing rapidly in small notebook, occasionally glancing at the screen. The girl didn't seem to notice the sound, nor when he walked quietly up to the table. "Have you found my research, then?"

She jumped, dropping her pen and bringing her notebook up to her rather ample chest like a shield. "_Fuck!_ Du-si-_Loki_, don't sneak up on me like that!" She set down the notebook, plucked a white wire from her ear, and peered back up at him. "Say again?"

"My research? The task I set you? Have you completed it?"

Her face was incredulous, and she shook her head as she bent down to retrieve the pen. "Uh, no. It's barely been three hours, I'm still mostly doing preliminaries. This isn't a fast process." She paused, considering. "Well, it would be if I were this one girl I knew, but I'm not and I don't know what happened to her so I'm guessing doing things fast gets you-" Loki felt his eyebrows raising higher the more she babbled, and she stopped herself," -nevermind, not important. No. Not done. It's gonna be a while. Be patient."

He sighed. "Mortal-Darcy. I am _bored_." The words came out far more plaintively than he'd have liked.

The girl's mouth twisted in amusement. "_Seriously?_ You're like a kid." He opened his mouth to protest and she raised her hands to forestall him. He was getting rather tired of that. "Sorry, uh, sir. Person." She paused, thinking. "You like books, right? Stories? I've got books." Loki nodded curtly.

She slid the chair out from the table and stood, brushing bits of paper off herself. The girl crooked a finger for him to follow her, and sighed at his affronted expression. "Sir." It would, perhaps, be foolish to admit how that word worked to balm a wounded ego.

There was a bookshelf on the far wall, small but over-full with several stacks of beaten paperbacks to either side. She knelt and considered for several moments before finally making a selection and standing to face him, smiling an oddly dazzling smile. "Silvertongue, right? This, like, totally stars a niece or something," she said, and proffered the book.

_The Golden Compass_. The cover had an image of a very blurry girlchild on it, and the book itself was old and falling apart, and probably should have been thrown away long ago. But the usage of his own name had piqued his interest, and he headed to her inadequate little couch to read, ignoring the quiet sigh behind him.

Time passed, and many phone calls were made. Loki ignored them, only taking time to note the gift of Allspeak was working well. Her inability to betray him was a comfort. He'd read the entire trilogy twice through before the mortal came to him, slightly wild-eyed from lack of sleep, a small red rectangle in her hand. Her slightly unsettling smile was strangely charming in its mania, and her words came out in a rush: "I've got it! He thinks I work at Culver and he's going to get another professor's data for his study-you don't care, I know you don't, but here! Got it! The research. The research you asked me for? Pyramid research." She held out the small object to him, and he glanced from it to her uncomprehendingly.

"Yes? Where is it?"

She blinked at him. "Seriously? I hope you don't expect me to print all this crap. It'd be like printing a book. At the library. Which is way out of my price range." She looked around and strode into her bedroom abruptly. Loki turned back to his book. It was several minutes before she returned triumphant, holding aloft a computer much like the one on the table, only looking _much_ the worse for wear, plugged it in, and flopped down next to him on the couch. "I found my old laptop!"

It took the better part of an hour for her to teach him to use the hideously outdated technology, not least because sleeplessness did very little to improve her conversation, and she kept trailing off on tangents and laughing endlessly at her own jokes. By the time it was done he was more than ready to simply disappear, and he did so, taking the computer and the three books with him. Better to peruse her work in _silence_.

Unfortunately, the sudden departure meant he did quite miss her sudden calculating grin.


	5. Chapter 5

Jane never meant to be bad at keeping in touch with people. It was just she always had so many things to think about that unless something specifically reminded her to call someone, she simply forgot. Thor (the bastard), in retrospect, had really lucked out with that. He was the stars. Even now it was difficult to not look up at the night sky and wonder about all the countless worlds out there and if he'd been to them. _My dearest Jane..._She wished he'd taken her with him. There was so much to learn, so much to explore...and he'd left her with only that most tantalizing taste: the confirmation that there was _more_ out there, everything even her wildest dreams hadn't touched, and she had no way to experience it or study it.

So it was a surprise when she checked her email to find a message from Darcy, and it was hard to ignore the sharp spike of guilt that went through her. Darcy, bless her, had been the one in charge of remembering the everyday of relationships and colleagues, instead of Jane's more usual style of random flashes of friendship-inspiration (_Hey, Joe! I know it's been a year and half but are you aware that there's a picture of a quasar that looks weirdly like you? We should catch up, no it wasn't an insult, you look perfectly normal..._). It had been very convenient, but the unfortunate side effect was that Jane had never had much cause to write things down about Darcy herself, and so once Darcy was gone it was very out-of-sight-out-of-mind.

Darcy was asking about her old papers on the time differential anomalies present among the pyramids. Which was something out of a daydream where Jane could convince all her lab assistants that Science was Most Important and things like sleeping or regular meals could definitely be put on hold for five more minutes with the telescope and Jane also always got her grant funding.

Jane sent her the papers, and wrote down a note about Darcy's atypical behavior. She promptly lost the note, but it was the writing it down that was important. When Jane saw the girl again, she would remember.

Darcy still had no idea what Loki was after, despite spending every free moment examining the data. Well. She had the shape of the idea, with all the research she'd done about it, like there was one piece of the puzzle directly in the center still missing. She'd know what would fit if she saw it, could maybe even describe it to you to some extent, but Darcy still didn't know what the actual piece _really_ looked like.

He hadn't asked her not to keep a copy of the requested research to herself, and neither had he asked her to obtain Jane's old work for him. Darcy knew there was something _incredibly_ dense, probably some sort of energy source since that seemed like most appealing thing possible to Loki, something that caused similar effects to a very tiny black hole without actually causing the whole sucked-into-an-inescapable-singularity issue. It wasn't exactly good science, but Darcy was willing to accept that it had to be something incredibly weird and beyond the knowledge of _mortals_ (it was difficult not to add mental airquotes around the word) if it involved Asgardians and their stupid magic. It had also stood the test of time and escaped the ravagings of tomb-robbers, the Victorian trend for stealing other country's history as souvenirs, and archaeologists desperate to catalogue and preserve everything else before anyone else decided the rest would be a nice conversation piece in their living room. Djoser had been stripped to the bone, but there was still something there.

She resolved to ask him about it, whenever he popped up again. Darcy knew he would, like a cold that just wouldn't go away and kept re-infecting you. She stopped leaving anything at her apartment or on her computer, instead bringing it with her wherever she went. It wasn't that much of a step up from obsessing over her phone like always, and no one batted an eye. Of course, when he _did_ return two months after her decision, she still hadn't quite figured out _how_ she'd ask him and actually get an answer. Darcy was, however, much more prepared to deal with him in general.

He still had her books, and it seemed his reason for showing up _this_ time was that he was _bored_. Again. Considering whatever he had cooking in Djoser was causing her curiosity to practically burn a hole in her skull, she was deeply unsympathetic. "I can't afford to just _give_ you my collection, and I don't think you can actually buy them off me. You're pretty much a space hobo." She paused, and added hurriedly: "Sir."

"I can order you to give me the books," he said mildly.

Darcy purse her lips slightly, thinking, and caught his eyes flick briefly to her mouth. _Huh_. It wasn't the first time it had happened, but it finally clicked for her that it was an _in_. If she was willing to take it. Darcy wasn't sure she was, but it was something to consider. She stepped closer, experimentally. "Yeah. You could. But, I bet you couldn't figure out something specific enough to actually get a real recommendation out of me, and I've definitely got enough unappealing-to-you claptrap that it would take a _long_ time to find anything good." Darcy took another step and stuck out her hand, palm-up, to get her books. Her hand nearly brushed his chest, and he stepped back slightly. Loki didn't seem to realize he'd done it. Good.

He sighed in an exaggeratedly aggrieved manner, the ghost of a smirk playing on his face. "Very well," he said, voice light, like it was a game. Darcy could do games. He made a gesture and the books appeared in his hand. He passed them to her, and Darcy curled her fingers around them quickly, making sure she just brushed the inside of his wrist.

She smiled. "Thank _you_." Darcy turned sharply and went to consider her bookshelf. She already knew what she was going to give him, but she wanted to think for a second without having to control her face, which wasn't exactly a strong point. Yet. Darcy, as was slightly inevitable for someone as stacked as she was, had known a lot of different types of boys (as very few of the male persuasion in her age range yet qualified for 'men'), no matter how many layers she tended to pile on.

Loki, as it turned out, wasn't that hard to figure out once you got past the initial brush of death. Reasonably smart, but thought he knew more than he did. Thought he liked people being devoted, but that was because he thought he was superior and could drop them without much consideration. The trick to the 'smart' ones, Darcy knew, was to keep them on the wrong foot at all times. And to hate them a bit. It was depressingly common to find a guy who turned to putty in your hands if you acted a bit like you hated him. That, at least, would be easy.

The phrase in romance novels was 'spirited'. She didn't think the inevitable blow up when she couldn't keep up the asshole act and started being one of the disposable devoted people would be an issue.

Darcy turned back to him, her best arch smile on, and held up _American Gods._ Possibly it was stupid, but she did want to see at least one Asgardian react to certain mythological inconsistencies, and Thor wasn't the storybook type. When he read, he was more interested in tactics than characters. "I figured we'd go from Silvertongue to something where you actually make an appearance. Odin's in it too, but I figure you'd appreciate Thor being dead. You're kind of awful like that." She said it lightly, her voice teasing, and he took it from her cautiously, his face slightly disconcerted.

He flipped through the book a few minutes, resolutely silent, and when he made eye contact again and Darcy _knew_ he was about to pull his disappearing act again, she blew him a kiss. It was gratifying to see the somewhat horrified look on his face before he vanished.

Two days later Darcy got a call from Jane, telling her that if she wanted another internship when the semester was over in a couple weeks, Erik needed them in London. Darcy was almost delighted to go. She had forgotten to ask her question, but at least she'd be on the right hemisphere. It was something. Besides, she hadn't given him the sequel.


	6. Chapter 6

Moving to London was not all Darcy's mom had cracked it up to be. For one thing, moving in with your boss and your boss's mom was not exactly a glam vacation/opportunity to hook up with James Bond lookalikes (so many options!), even if it was free. And Jane wasn't doing well.

Jane was the one who met Darcy at the airport, all alone and carrying a completely illegible sign. Well, she had probably carried it at one point. By the time Darcy actually spotted the other woman, Jane had turned in a completely different direction than the disembarking area and was glaring at a movie poster with a spacey picture on it. The sign was on the floor resting against her legs. Darcy immediately felt herself relax. It was so easy to be chill around Jane, because Jane was the sort of person who did all the unchill _for _you.

"What's shakin', eggs and bacon?"

Jane shook herself and turned to Darcy. Her eyes were reddish, and she had that half-feral look that meant she hadn't had any sort of sleep schedule or meal plan for at least a week. "What?"

Darcy patted her on the shoulder and bent to pick up the sign. "I said 'Hey, boss'. I am _super_ hungry." The best way to get Jane's feet back on the ground at that stage was to make it all about someone other than Jane.

She blinked and murmured: "I'm sure that wasn't it."

Darcy nudged Jane's boot with her toe. "We need to go pick up my luggage now. Where's Erik? I was kinda counting on, like, Swedish man-strength or whatever."

"I haven't heard from him. Darcy, I haven't heard from him since he convinced me to come out here!" Jane was worse than Darcy's initial assessment. She'd gotten to the twitchy stage.

Darcy looped her arm through Jane's and slowly strolled in the direction of the baggage claim. "It's been two weeks, Jane, and I just got here. Obviously he was waiting for _me_, because _you_ have gone off the deep end of Science." Science was pretty much always a capital around Jane. "So we're gonna get something to eat, have naps because you know I hate planes and I can already feel the jetlag. And then _we'll_ call Erik and tell him if he doesn't get his ass in gear and answer his phone, that Norwegian dude we met last year that he hates is going to be your new go-to stuffy male scientist."

Jane grinned, a sudden evil glint in her eye. Mission accomplished. Darcy handed her the purse and grabbed the rolling suitcase for herself.

"You've been here two weeks, does non-gross British food even exist? Lead the way."

Frigga had been spending most of her time at her loom, trying to read anything about her sons. Loki was gone, no trace of him that even Heimdall could find. Thor had become wrapped up in the fighting that had broken out across the realms, as soon as the Bifrost had been repaired. He had not rested more than a single night at a time in Asgard since.

It was not a good time to be a mother to princes. Every moment not spent in court was spent weaving, searching for some message of the future. It was not a happy occupation. But it did mean she wasn't terribly surprised when she returned one day to find a small, smooth, flat golden disk on the small table by her loom.

The moment she touched it to pick it up, words engraved themselves upon it:

_Frigga. Truly have I seen the error of my ways, and have realized that conquering Midgard was the height of foolishness. A mortal helped me escape the battle and for it I am eternally grateful. But still I run from Thanos, and I do not know when he will find me. I may at some point need to come home. If you have need of me, I have the copy of this coin. I will receive your message._

Frigga smiled bitterly. At least he was alive, although the mortal might not be. He did seem to forget who taught him most of his trickery, though. One of his worst habits. He was alive, and if another person was dead then that would have to be added to the list of his crimes. But her son was alive. She could not help but be comforted by that, even for all he had become. She turned the coin over, and pressed her palm against the surface.

_I am your mother, Loki. I do not wish you dead._

The response was prompt: _Well, that's a relief._

Jane's mother was an archivist, which was not even slightly surprising to Darcy. What _was_ surprising was that the woman lived alone in a multi-bedroom apartment in a city like London, and had graciously loaned the usage of it to her daughter while she was spending a year updating files on religious texts in France. Clearly, Darcy needed to reconsider her major. Screw world domination, old books was clearly where it was at.

Contrary to Darcy's proclamation at the airport, Erik still hadn't gotten back in touch with Jane after a week, and she was starting to unravel with concern again. Darcy was antsy as well, and had started leaving Jane in the lab so she could distract herself with schoolwork. It probably wasn't the best idea, but after the fourth night of no word they'd start arguing in circles and since neither of them actually knew where Erik had been when he'd told Jane to come, they couldn't call the police. So wait and do various kinds of science it was.

It was then that Loki finally made his return, popping into Darcy's room while she was doing an online class and listening to music, and nearly gave her a heart attack. "Jesus christ, dude!"

"Where have you been?!" he snarled, loud enough for Darcy to hear over the music. She turned it off. Somehow 'Bubblegum Bitch' didn't seem appropriate. He looked...a bit like Jane snarling about Erik, actually.

"Uh. Here." She closed the laptop and narrowed her eyes. "_You_ can't be here, though! What if Jane hears? Why are you here? _How_ are you here? How did you even find me? I only even had time to call my _mom_ the day after I landed!"

Loki deflated slightly, and shrugged. "Blood calls to blood."

Darcy blinked in confusion at the sudden switch in tone. "What?" He rolled his eyes and pressed two cool fingertips to her forehead. Where he'd drawn the mark. "Oh." She shuddered and pushed his hand away. "That's super creepy. And Jane?"

She would say he flopped down onto the bed at her feet, if it weren't him. 'Flopped' didn't seem like quite the right word, too ungraceful. Or maybe just too human. Regardless, he settled himself and waved a hand lazily through the air before responding. "There. You could kill something in here and an eavesdropper wouldn't know."

"That's just _so_ comforting, coming from you." Darcy closed her laptop and set it on the night table. Even if he left immediately, there was no way she was getting any more classwork done for the evening. She stretched her legs out, deliberately prodding him in the side with her foot. Instantly Loki grabbed her ankle and yanked the offending appendage off the edge of the bed and out of his way. Darcy smacked his hand lightly. "_My_ bed. What's the order today, _sir_? Or are you just bored again?"

"And such a sad little bed it is," he murmured. Louder, he said: "The second one, of course. I'm afraid you've no other use to me as of now."

"_Thanks_." Although considering the alternatives, she couldn't feel too offended. She leaned down and dug through the suitcase still lying open on the floor next to the bed, full of books for her classes. Darcy pulled out one at random, and pressed it to Loki's chest after a glance at the title. Contact, that was the thing. "Here. _Existentialism and Humanism_, it's some human thinky thoughts. Maybe take some advice and get your shit together, huh?"

He raised his eyebrows coolly, and disappeared with the book.

Erik Selvig could not find a well-fitting pair of pants to save his life.

There was a cute boy at the coffee shop by the house. Darcy had started spending her days there three weeks after she'd landed in London, as Jane became harder and harder to coax out of her room. Even Science couldn't tempt her boss, and the apartment/lab was too lonely without some kind of purpose. If it went on for much longer, Darcy might even begin to look forward to Loki's visits, if only for something to _do_.

So the coffee shop it was, and the cute-in-a-nerdy-way guy who didn't protest very much when Darcy plunked herself down at his otherwise empty table in the crowded café. Truth be told, she'd chosen his table because he was reading one of the weird space magazines Jane got and Jane must have rubbed off on Darcy too much, because she was starting to _miss_ Science. And think of it with a capital 'S' _sincerely_. It was a tragedy of the highest order.

It took a week of bumping into each other for them to start talking, and Darcy managed a month without bringing up Jane, Science, or anything actually factual about her personal life. As it turned out, Cute Nerd/Science Guy (Darcy couldn't remember his name to save her life, but it was a daily struggle not to call him 'Bill') was a _big_ fan. "Wait. Jane Foster? _Doctor_ Jane Foster? Noted astrophysicist _Jane Foster_?" His voice jumped half an octave on the last bit.

"Uh. Yeah?" Darcy took a sip of her coffee and grimaced. Her tongue was doing the thing where she couldn't taste anything anymore but the ache in her teeth from the sugar, even though she didn't take her coffee particularly sweet. It was a shame London was so freakin' cold, she could have done with an ice water. The amount of coffee she was having daily couldn't have been a good thing.

"You said you were a political science major!" Science Guy's voice was incredulous, and Darcy glared at him.

"Yeah, and I've been working for her for..." She did some mental calculations. _Count the schoolyear or don't count the schoolyear? _"Fuck, I don't know, almost two years. Got a problem?"

He turned sheepish. "No, I'm sorry, I didn't mean...D'you think she could use a second assistant?" He was especially adorable when he was hopeful. Darcy forgave him.

"No. But I could probably use one, the way she's going." She stretched in her chair and stood. "Actually, I should probably go check on her now." Darcy patted his shoulder. "Get back to you on the job thing, Science Guy."

"My name's Ian..." he said plaintively as she walked out of the coffee shop. Sadly, she was already thinking of other things.

It didn't take long for Loki to fall into step beside her after she left the shop. He'd taken to doing that the second day she'd invaded Ian's table. At least the suit was nice, although Darcy wondered about his ability to stay incognito when his face had been on the news at least a couple of times. She didn't ask. If he was the one who got them caught, it'd be the best thing to happen to her since he'd dropped in in the first place. "You don't like him, do you?"

Loki rolled his eyes slightly. "He's not S.H.I.E.L.D. I must monitor you."

Darcy snorted and looped her arm around his, ignoring the way he froze for a moment at her touch. "You know, I hadn't actually thought about that. I'll have to keep it in mind."

He tried to tug his arm away and whirl around to glare at her, but Darcy held on and kept resolutely trudging towards the apartment. "You _will_ not," he hissed.

"No, I won't. I prefer not being dead." She didn't look at him, but she could feel Loki's metaphorical feathers settling. "You finish the book yet? I need it back."

"Yes." There was an abrupt extra weight in her laptop bag.

"Walk me home and I'll give you a new one."

Erik Selvig's shirts had all become inexcusably itchy, no matter how many times he washed them. It was impossible to concentrate.

Loki was going through Darcy's books at a truly voracious pace. For the past month and a half he'd been showing up almost daily, looking for something new. He was, frankly, getting on her nerves. Which was something Darcy hadn't ever expected to be an emotion that applied to an actual murderer, but there it was. It turned out the fight-or-flight reflex dulled when you gave someone Thomas Pynchon* to read and they didn't even _try_ to strangle you for it. Instead, he'd merely returned six hours after taking the book in the first place and held it up for her to see, whereupon it spontaneously combusted. Darcy couldn't even bring herself to mind the loss of selling-it-back-to-the-bookstore cash. Her fault for assuming anyone could be _that_ desperate for a distraction.

It finally struck Darcy that he was being _antsy_. He covered it much better than Jane, which was probably why Darcy hadn't picked up on it. Jane had quickly reasserted herself as Darcy's baseline expectations for social interaction. She had a Way. Capital W. But there was tension in Loki's otherwise perfect posture, the merest suggestion that he was hunched over her latest selection. He'd woken her up just to get the next Thursday Next, and she hadn't exactly pegged him as a 'metatextual jokes' type of guy. Especially since she kept having to explain certain cultural references to him that he was too lazy to look up. At least Thor had been willing and eager to learn the art of googling.

Loki was sitting on the foot of her bed, as usual (and it was strange to think she'd developed a 'usual' with him), frowning at the book and flipping through the pages. Darcy watched him. His eyes weren't focusing on the pages, instead staring dully at a perfectly innocent patch of the carpet. She sighed and stopped playing with the end of her braid, leaned over to rest a hand on his shoulder and plastered on her most sympathetic expression. "So what's eating you?"

His eyes snapped to her face with an alarming sharpness, then drifted lazily downwards. _Right. No more tanks for bed._ At least she was wearing pants. Small blessings. Darcy snapped her fingers in front of his nose, and he grabbed her hand. Smiling slightly, Loki looked her in the eye and winked. "Something is beginning to happen."

"That's very specific."

He snorted quietly. "A convergence of the realms. It is...infrequent."

Darcy moved towards him and moved her other hand to his knee. She tried to keep breathing. _Best chance to ask, put on 'genuine concern'._ "Is this something to do with what you wanted that research for?"

The grip on her fingers tightened slightly. "You should forget about that."

Darcy tried desperately for guileless. "I'm just curious!" She slid her hand up his a thigh a fraction.

Loki narrowed his eyes at the movement and let go of her hand, instead pushing her away from him. "What are you doing?"

She held up her hands, all innocence. "Nothing, I swear." She fiddled with the end of her braid and tried not to frown at her knees. Visible disappointment was not a good angle.

"You've got potential, I suppose, but you're not very good at this. Yet." His voice was mild. Darcy felt his weight shift closer to her on the bed, and then one warm hand pressed firmly into the small of her back, the other on her inner thigh. A cool breath flowed along the exposed side of her neck and involuntarily she arched into the touch, shivering. Suddenly her skin was on fire and she was definitely not going to look at Loki.

"You're not the only one who can play this game, you know." The whisper in her ear sent another shudder through her, and Darcy couldn't help but risk a glance. His eyes locked onto hers immediately, and he was grinning like a cat. She flushed, and his grin widened.

He pressed a kiss to the corner of her jaw, and vanished.


	7. Chapter 7

_She has a date? HOW does she have a date?_ Darcy couldn't have read Jane's little note correctly. She was sleep deprived, obviously having not been able to sleep after Loki's little visit. It'd be easier if she could figure out if she wanted to strangle him or _strangle him_. Besides, when would Jane have had the time? She'd only left the apartment once in the past three weeks, and that was a grocery run because Darcy had forgotten the 'critically important' party rings. Fucking British not-cookies.

Apparently a grocery run after only the most cursory of showers was enough for perfect beautiful _mermaid_ Jane.

At least the note mentioned where she was going. Darcy took it and her coffee into the designated lab room and put up her feet for a long day of nothin'. She didn't want to talk to Loki, not immediately, and ironically _not_ going out was the best way to avoid him, since he'd gone all proprietary on her. Theoretically that was a good step towards the goal of 'avoiding other aspects of minionhood via feminine wiles', except now he _knew_. She hoped he'd find the book just at the right level of incomprehensible that he'd take forever with it, but wouldn't bother her about it.

After a while, Darcy finished her coffee and got up to throw the cup away. That was when she noticed the not-Gameboy was doing a thing. A thing that involved swirly bits and occasional beeping. _Great. It's broken._ She rapped it a couple of time with her knuckles and looked more closely when that did exactly nothing. It took her a moment to realize what was so familiar: the swirly bits and the beeping matched the projected readings in the file that Erik had sent Jane in the first place. That was probably important. But she was _not_ in the mood for scientist-wrangling that morning. Especially not if it meant wrangling Jane away from a well-deserved date. Especially not on zero sleep. Darcy paused and pulled out her phone. Two bird with one nerd: wrongfoot Loki and get some backup for Jane. "Hey, Science Guy. Yeah, sure, whatever. Listen, remember how I work for Jane Foster? I totally need an intern. Yeah, you get to meet her. Sweet. Be there in five!"

The restaurant Jane's note directed her to was way fancier than any place Darcy had ever worked in, much less been to, and she had to take a second to breathe in the wealth before she zeroed in on Jane and a cute-in-an-extremely-nerdy guy who was about as far as you could get from Thor. Understandable.

He saw her first. "Hi! Um, could we get some wine, please?"

"Sure, I'd love some." If anyone needed a drink, it was definitely Darcy. And there could be _no way_ he actually thought she was a waitress. She was wearing a _hat_. And a _coat_.

Jane sighed slightly. "Richard, this is Darcy." _Richard, huh?_ Darcy gave her a thumbs up and mouthed 'cute'. Jane did not seem to approve. "What are you doing here?"

Darcy pulled up a chair and grabbed a piece of bread because she was hungry and, frankly, if this guy was gonna go out with Jane, he should probably get used to weird early. Also, _fancy_ bread. Rich people restaurant food! "Sup! So, I show up for work at the lab-slash-your-mom's-house, fully expecting you to be moping around in your pajamas eating ice cream and obsessing about-" Darcy cleared her throat, trying to think of the best way to phrase it, "_you-know-who_…But you're not! You're wearing lady clothes! You even showered didn't you?" She sniffed. "You smell good."

Jane looked _slightly_ murderous. "Is there a point to all of this? Because there really needs to be a point to all of this."

Darcy put down her piece of (delicious) bread. "Right. You know all that scientific equipment you don't look at anymore?" She pulled the not-gameboy out of her coat and passed it to Jane. "You might want to start looking at it again. This _is_ the reason we came all the way out here."

Jane stared at it. "It's malfunctioning."

"That's what I said."

Jane rapped it a couple times against the table, and Darcy repressed an eyeroll. "That's what I did! Thought you would do something a little more...scientific." She wiggled her fingers at the other woman for emphasis.

Jane smiled awkwardly at her cute-but-clearly-not-_that_-smart-if-he-couldn't-identify-a-waitress date. "I'm sure it's nothing." She handed the not-gameboy back to Darcy, who again had suppress a roll of the eyes.

"Doesn't look like nothing. Kinda looks like the readings that Eric was rambling about." She turned to the date. "Our friend Erik? Kinda went-" Darcy paused, trying for tactful and failing. She made 'wacko' sign and settled on: "banana-balls."

Jane was now looking _very_ murderous, for Jane. "I'm not interested. I'm not interested! Time for you to go now!" _Rude._

"Okay," said Darcy, making a face and getting up. Normally she'd support Jane going for a dude over Science _for once_, but any dude Jane was trying to hide the weird from was clearly not the One. Darcy didn't really believe in the One, but Jane had _literally_ had a whirlwind romance with a _prince_, so obviously the rules were different for her.

It didn't take long for Jane to call it quits and come to the car, where Darcy was waiting. Because duh. Cute or not, that dude was not enough to defeat the siren call of Science.

She looked less miffed when she got into the car. "Aaand I hate you."

Darcy shrugged. "What? I said he was cute!"

"Just shut up and drive."

Darcy couldn't resist a slightly shit-eating grin at that.

Shortly, Intern (he'd been upgraded upon hiring) popped up out of the backseat from whatever he was doing; scaring the life out of Jane, who apparently would _not_ survive a horror movie. "You need to take the next left."

"Who's _he_?" asked Jane.

"He's my intern," replied Darcy, feeling slightly smug/proud. Smoud. _Moving up in the world, Darce_.

"You have an intern?" Jane sounded slightly incredulous. Today was not her day.

"Oh, yeah." Sometimes it was best to just move Jane along new things without letting her get too caught up in the details.

Intern, meanwhile, seemed like he was going to legit cream his pants. "He-hello, Dr. Foster. It's a-it's a great honor to be working with you."

Jane nodded slightly. Nervous and awed college students weren't exactly new to her, from what she'd told Darcy, although they had apparently gotten less frequent since the S.H.I.E.L.D. weirdness after New Mexico. "Right. I have to call Erik."

One or the other of them still called him daily and left a message. His voicemail _still_ wasn't full, so Darcy guessed that he was at least _looking_ at his phone occasionally, but there was still no answer. She and Jane had both gotten rather resigned to it, even if it still took cute-but-not-even-slightly-perceptive to get her out of her slump. _At least I know it's not Loki that's messing with him, now..._Darcy forced herself not to shudder at the thought. She did _not_ like the idea of two-thirds of Team Jane being compromised. Maybe she'd have Intern stick around longer than she'd initially planned.

Although, frankly, after dealing with his navigation skills, Darcy was very much reconsidering that thought. He did not seem to understand the concept of giving her time to turn. She _was_ feeling slightly proud that she'd made it to their destination without having to backtrack or having any oncoming crazypants crash into them.

Jane was still irate by the time they got there, but she had started to perk up at the sight of a giant truck on its side and the Stonehenge of freight containers. Darcy gave her enough time to have the Intern get their stuff and lock the car before she herded her to the not-gameboy's hotspot proper.

The creepy factory was even more horror movie set on the inside, if it were possible. Complete with jump-scare-ready birds and the pitter-patter of tiny demonic feet. "I am _not_ getting stabbed in the name of science." Darcy raised her hands and said, louder: "It's okay, we're Americans!"

"_Is that supposed to make them like us?_" hissed Jane.

Three whispering children stepped out from their hiding places, and Darcy put her hands down. "Oh, they're kids," said Jane, relieved, although Darcy personally felt that any child who hung out in _incredibly weird_ abandoned factories was automatically suspect.

"Are you the police?"

Jane took a small step forward. "No, we're scientists. Well, I am."

Darcy looked at Jane flatly. "_Thanks._"

The kids, at least, seemed less frightened. "We just found it."

Jane took another step, and Darcy could see her hands tremble slightly. Darcy held her breath, trying not to hope too much that maybe whatever the kids found will finally center Jane again. "Will you show us?"

They didn't have much further to go before they see something that makes Jane gasp and make Darcy _very_ glad she's not the one carting around the VIP of toasters, because she would _definitely_ have dropped it. "That doesn't seem right..."

There was a cement truck floating a foot off the ground, and it only took a single gentle push from one of the kids to send it spinning in midair. Jane approached it, her face an odd mix of consternation and wonder, then turned suddenly to the kid who'd done it. "Is there anything else?"

The group led them to a stairwell and went about halfway up before they stopped and looked up. The kid that had gone on ahead was a floor above them, and he dropped a bottle partially filled with what Darcy hoped was leftover orange soda. It fell for two floors before it vanished, a ripple in the air like circles in water.

Jane looked sharply at the apparent leader of the group. "Where'd it go?" The girl pointed back up, and their gazes all followed her. The bottle reappeared, a little above where it had been dropped, and fell back to the same spot before vanishing again. The kids let the loop repeat another couple of times before one reached out and grabbed the bottle out of the air.

Jane's mouth was hanging open slightly, and after a moment Darcy remember to close her own. "That's-that's incredible." Jane sounded excited again, for the first time in a while, and Darcy couldn't resist a smile as Jane hunted for something to drop herself and came up with an empty can. The scientist dropped it, and they watched with matching grins as it disappeared and looked up to watch it fall back.

Nothing dropped from the sky in turn. Jane looked back at the girl. "What happened?"

The girl shrugged. "Sometimes they come back, sometimes they don't."

_Huh_. Darcy shrugged as well, and grinned again. "I want to throw something!" She turned to Jane. The woman owed her, since it was Darcy who had been the one in the lab watching the equipment and not going on dates with cute-but-mediocre dudes. "Jane, gimme your shoe."

Jane ignored her and grabbed the not-gameboy from off the phase meter. She stared at it, the familiar curious smile playing across her mouth. "I haven't seen readings like this since...since..."

Darcy watched her fondly. "Since New Mexico?"

Jane stared at her for a moment, brain almost audibly whirring. Suddenly, she looked _very_ determined and pushed Darcy to one side. "Don't touch anything!" she called as she ran off. Jane would be all right. She sounded like her old self again. Darcy had missed it.

She snorted slightly, watching the other woman go, and turned to the Intern. "Give me your shoe," she commanded, pointing. There was _no way_ Darcy was relinquishing any footwear. That would be asking for a horrible disease.

He didn't give her his shoe, and she didn't press when he gave her a slightly sad puppy look, but the kids apparently had a stash of bricks. They all took turns chucking one in and watching it fall through the loop, giggling. That was, until the Intern threw something in and it didn't reappear. It took a second for Darcy's brain to catch up. "Were those the...car keys?"

The Intern stared in horror at the gap in the stairwell above them. Darcy sighed. _Fucking physicists_.

They waited for several minutes in resigned hope before Darcy realized Jane still wasn't back. She glared at the man. "You wait here and _pray_ those keys decide to be the one thing that comes back." He gulped. "_Pray_."

Darcy followed the stairs up, looking down all the hallways for signs of the wayward scientist. When she got to the roof of the building with still no sign or even an echo of muttered technobabble, she began to panic. There were two other stairwell entrances on the massive roof, and Darcy ran for the furthest one and took the stairs down two at a time, calling Jane's name several times on each floor. Still nothing.

She got lost at least twice on the way back to the stairwell with the Intern, despite the fact she could hear him calling for her and Jane. If anything, it just made her panic more. Jane should have been able to hear her yelling, even if the woman had gotten completely lost in her science-addled state. Jane, after a month of careful training with baked goods from the _good_ grocery stores, had learned to respond to her name even if she'd mentally gone five galaxies away.

Darcy was out of breath by the time she found the Intern again. The kids were all gone, probably having fled when she'd starting screaming like a loon from the other side of the factory. He looked terrified and was clutching the phase meter like a shield. She grabbed his arm to steady herself, trying to get her breathing back to something that didn't involve hyperventilating.

_Something is beginning to happen. A...convergence of the realms._ Loki's words from the night before echoed in Darcy's head. _He couldn't...could he?_ Suddenly, Darcy couldn't remember if the words of her agreement with Loki meant he couldn't hurt Jane...or if it was only that he couldn't _kill_ her. There were a lot of things you could do to a person while they were alive, and they all popped to the forefront of Darcy's mind in an instant.

He hadn't _seemed_ upset, merely amused, when he'd (finally, thought the part of Darcy that always had a comment ready, even if she was losing her shit) cottoned on to her clumsy attempts at working him. He'd seemed amused in the way she was going for, actually, but that wasn't reliable. Thor had grown up with the man, you'd think he'd've known his own brother's tells. And he'd definitely been blindsided. Except Thor had grown up with the man, and the familiar things are the ones you stop noticing because they're always there. Darcy took a long breath. Loki hadn't seemed upset. And if he _was_ upset, Darcy could figure out something. She could always figure out something.

"Er...Darcy?" The Intern's voice pulled her out of her reverie, and her head snapped up to look at him. He looked bewildered. "That kind of hurts?"

She realized she was still clutching his arm, and let go instantly. Darcy patted the spot, smoothing the wrinkles from his hoodie. He winced. "Sorry, dude. Um. Do you think you could go back to the apartment and wait in the lab?" She gestured at the phase meter, still in his arms. "That needs to go back. Can you find your way? I need to look for Jane."

He nodded vigorously, eyes wide. Darcy tried to smile in a reassuring way, but she was pretty sure it came out more as 'leave or I will eat you', because he very quickly made to leave. He was a floor down when something else occurred to her, and she leaned over the railing. "Wait! Do you have the number for the police, in case I can't find her?"

After she got the number and a short explanation of the etiquette of calling the cops in England, Darcy waited until even the echoes of his footsteps died away, and slumped against the railing. After a few moments of steeling herself, she looked upwards. "Loki? You there? You listening? I need to talk to you right _fucking_ now!" She waited several minutes, with no familiar smirking man appearing around a corner. "Loki! LOKI!"

It figured that the one time she'd actually be _trying_ to talk to him, he wouldn't be there. She supposed it was her own fault. Darcy scrubbed a hand over her face, thinking, and paused. She took a breath, and recited: "I am Darcy Lewis, college student." The words that came out of her mouth were unfamiliar, although they sounded vaguely Eastern European. She'd been going for Latvian, and she had to assume it had worked. _Although if you've any magical talent it may...stick around_. Darcy wasn't exactly sure what the intended timeframe had been, considering he was functionally immortal to her, but she hoped six months was long enough.

Would the possibility of magical talent be useful without actually _knowing_ any magic, though? It was worth a shot. Blood seemed to be as good a starting point as any, and she fumbled in the pocket of her coat for her latest steak-knife acquisition (Darcy had never thought she'd be even _slightly_ grateful to the NRA, and she still wasn't, but she _was_ getting very sick of having to gallivant around strange countries without her taser). She pulled it out and slid off her coat, folding it carefully over the railing. She was _not_ going to lose it to blood or space shenanigans. As Darcy positioned the blade over the back of her forearm (least risky place to cut), she paused. Blood was a good start, but what to do with it? Almost automatically, she touched her forehead again. The presence of magic already could only help. Probably. Hopefully.

Gritting her teeth, Darcy cut a ragged red line across the back of her arm. Blood welled up immediately, and she dabbed at it with her index finger before smearing it across the spot on her forehead where Loki had drawn his symbol. She concentrated on him, all the fear and all the hate for what he'd done. But the irritation as well, over the incessant book-hogging, and the small pleasure of someone actually reading what she gave them for once. Even the way her skin had burned the night before. The way she didn't mind him that much, if she could just keep him contained and everyone else _safe_.

Darcy felt something like a full-body _snap_, and rather anticlimactically, all she could think to say was exactly what she wanted to say to _him_: "Loki, get your skinny ass down here, _now!_"

Loki was reading, trying to relax in the space that he _certainly_ wasn't going to call his 'lair', but was also definitely not his home. It had been a rather decent suite of rooms, empty and on the market before he'd arrived and laid down his spells to make the owners forget they even had it. He made do with the furnishings already present, though sparse, as he did not intend to stay much past the convergence. He knew where the Hekaton was, and that for him it would be simple enough to obtain, as degraded as its defenses had become without proper maintenance.

Of course, one he had it he had no idea what he would _do_ with it. He hadn't planned that far. Loki had noticed, as of late, that his plans had an unfortunate habit of falling completely apart right at the climax. He did not wish to repeat the experience a third time in as many tries. Something would come up, he was sure, and until it did possessing one of the stones would give him a small measure of insurance against Thanos' armies. Safety finally came before the power he was due. Loki would not make such allies again.

In the meantime, he had a day or two to wait until the convergence ended, and time enough to decode the mortal's damnable book. It was supposed to be a comedy, and he could recognize the jokes, but it was impossible to tell what was a cultural reference and what was meant to merely flow by on a wave of the amusingly bizarre. He felt like something was being gotten over on him, and he did not like the sensation.

At least he wasn't the only one who'd lost their balance. It was, he could admit, slightly embarrassing that he had not realized she'd been trying to manipulate him before. But it had been surprisingly pleasant, the idle companionship of shared stories and-even-casual touch. Loki did not hate Odin or Midgard's fumbling attempts at civilization any less, but it had settled into his bones, where it rested and no longer would explode quite so...expansively. And even as it powered him, it was exhausting. The semblance of being able to trust someone, even if it was only because he had bent them to his will by means of magic, was a welcome relief.

He smiled, thinking of the way she had trembled when he'd touched her, her eyes going dark. He'd quite like to make her do it again, although giving her time to become nervous about it was probably ideal from a planning point of view. He could decide after he finished the book.

_Loki_. He looked up and shut the book sharply, glancing around the room. Nothing had changed, and there had been no sense of alertness that meant someone had breached the perimeter he'd set. The sound had been fainter than a whisper, the voice too quiet for recognition. _Loki!_ It was stronger this time, enough for Loki to realize that it wasn't a sound at all. It was Darcy, his name rolling out from the faint sense of her he'd established with their bargain. He frowned. It seemed she was attempting to summon him, something she should not have been able to do as a mere Midgardian.

Clearly he'd had more of an effect than he'd thought, which was disconcerting and a little worrying. A useful minion was not one who fell so easily into obsession. Still, Loki put on his most charming grin and focused on the vague sense of her, and appeared several feet away.

He was prepared for her to look out of sorts, but he was not prepared for the combination of terror and _righteous fury_ writ across her face. Her eyes were wide and her hair was disheveled, the hat she wore in London's dreary weather nowhere to be seen. Her right arm bled sluggishly from a long but shallow cut, and there were traces of blood left on her face, the leftovers that her fumbling (and yet somehow _successful_) attempt to contact him hadn't used up. In her left hand there was a bit of a cutlery, a knife, but as she strode towards him it shifted with an ease of familiarity Loki hadn't expected of her.

She stopped just short of reach, glowering. "What. Have you done. With _Jane?_" Her voice was a ragged snarl, and he wondered suddenly what she'd actually been up to.

Loki raised his eyebrows coolly. "Nothing that I recall. Why, has she wandered off to become a stray?" She didn't respond, merely waited for the explanation she felt was due. He raised his hands, mimicking the posture she always took when she tried to appease him. "Truly. I have done nothing."

Darcy watched him stonily for another moment before slumping suddenly to sit on the floor, dropping the knife as she did so and covering her face with her hands. The improvised weapon clattered to a stop at his feet, and Loki kicked it behind him. It was extremely unlikely she'd actually have been able to hurt him, but it never did to let the underlings get ideas.

"Fuck. Fuck!" She dropped her hands to rub her arm, and seemed surprised when her palm came away red. She looked up at him. "If it wasn't _you_...I need to call the cops." She looked down at her hand again. "I need to clean this and _then_ call the cops, so they don't think I _murdered_ her."

Loki thought a moment. It was unlikely that what passed for a Midgardian police force would be able to do much. Occasionally, a brick fell through the air behind Darcy, and it was always the same brick. If Thor's mortal toy had gone astray in the convergence, it was likely the man himself would be showing up sooner than later. He stepped towards the woman seated on the floor and held out a hand. "I believe I may be of some assistance in that matter."

She eyed the offered palm warily, and Loki smiled again. "Of course, you will be needing to keep an eye on a certain man with a hammer. I've no doubt he'll find time to visit soon."

After a second of consideration, Darcy shrugged and placed her sticky hand in his and pulled herself up. Loki closed his eyes, still gripping her hand, and the blood on both of them vanished. "He hasn't so far," she said, voice dull.

Loki pulled her closer, examining the cut. He ran one finger down the length, causing her to wince slightly, but it closed up with not a mark left. "This is, I think, a special occasion." Darcy's mouth twisted and she started to pull away, but he merely tightened his grip until she stilled. "You will follow him where ever he goes, and keep an eye on him for me. Do _not_ tell Thor of my presence, do you understand?"

She nodded grudgingly, but something flickered in her eyes. Loki reached out and grabbed her chin, forcing her to look him full in the face. "Or Odin, should he follow."

Disappointment washed across her features, but nevertheless she bit out a "Fine."

Loki smiled and let her go. Surprisingly, she remained still and didn't immediately go to make space between them. He stepped closer, testing, and there was no change. "I'm sure I'll see you again soon."

After he was gone, Darcy shook herself and turned to retrieve her phone from her coat. Dialing the number the Intern had given her, she went to find her hat.


End file.
